Some of you may already know this but did you know some versions of the Old Testament of the Bible can have 53 or more books in it. The four major versions of the Old Testament of the Bible are the Hebrew Bible (a.k.a Mikra or TaNak/Tanakh), The Orthodox Bible, The Catholic Bible, and Protestant Bible.
The interesting part is that all these versions and some other versions out there are mostly based on the Septuagint which is a collection of up to 53 books that was a translation of the Hebrew Bible and some related texts from Hebrew into Koine Greek. The Hebrew Bible (Which has 24 books) and The Protestant Bible Old Testament includes exactly the same information, but the Protestant organized it into 39 books. For example, the Hebrew Bible has one book of Samuel, while the Protestant Bible has I and II Samuel—same book, but divided into two parts. The Catholic Bible includes the Tobit, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus (Sirach), Baruch (includes the Letters of Jeremiah), I and II Maccabees, and additions to Daniel and Esther and the Orthodox Bible includes all the Septuagint books.
Below is a comparative chart of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. This chart is based on one I found online at http://catholic-resources.org/Bible/Heb-Xn-Bibles.htm.
Hebrew and Christian Bibles Comparative Chart |
